Frank Haley’s son, Matt, wrote this tribute to his daddy. I was blessed to read it at the service yesterday. Matt is such an excellent writer just like his Daddy!
Around 300 folks attended the Memorial service for Frank at Sandia Baptist Church. The wonderful folks at Sandia Baptist were such wonderful hosts! Glory! It was an awesome blessing to be part of the service. Myself, Dan Rosecrans, Steve Stucker, Matt Haley and Tracy Crandall were honored to speak.
By the way, the next time you see Tracy, tell him he is a preacher, but he doesn’t know it yet! We all love the Haley family so much!!!
From Matt Haley:
It strikes me standing here today, that I knew Frank Haley longer than anybody else in this room. He was my hero, in every sense of the word. I wish more people were like my dad.
He was the kindest, gentlest, most generous person I ever met. Ever. My sister and I like to joke that dad never once met a stranger. And it’s the truth. He could turn a casual acquaintance into a lifelong friend and he kept them for life – hundreds and hundreds of them. He never asked them for anything and he gave them everything he could, usually his time, his ear, and his love. I wish more people were like my dad.
He didn’t drink. He didn’t smoke. He didn’t curse. He did shoot. In fact, he was an expert marksman. He didn’t shoot at animals or people, he just liked to shoot. In fact, I regularly saw the man pick off beer cans on top of fence posts from the saddle at 30 yards – at a full gallop with a pistol. He used to tell me he thought he’d been born 100 years too late. Along with that ‘old west’ sensibility came gentility.
Horses loved him and so did people, probably because he treated them both as equals. I wish more people were like my dad.
One of the things I admired most about my dad is that he didn’t mistreat people. He didn’t make fun of them. He didn’t belittle them. He didn’t talk about them behind their backs, and he didn’t compare himself to them to make himself feel better. He didn’t care one whit about impressing people.
His office at home is stuffed full of all the awards he won throughout his life, and he just sort of stuck them in there and forgot about them. He didn’t need people’s compliments or adulation. He just wanted them to know that they were loved and that God loved them – no matter what.
He felt that if he could provide an example to others of how one can turn one’s life around, they would come to God on their own. As much as he enjoyed preaching, he didn’t preach to people about fire and brimstone, and how they were going to hell. If they didn’t accept Jesus into their hearts, he wanted them to know of the Lord’s undying and eternal love for them, no matter what they did. I wish more people were like my dad.
In many ways, I was the luckiest boy in the world, because I had a father who didn’t think that showing me affection meant he was somehow less of a man, and that telling me he loved me wasn’t weakness. He didn’t need to be macho or bully me so that it would toughen me up. His sentiment was one of his greatest characteristics, and we used to call each other regularly just to tell each other that we loved each other. I never had to worry whether or not he was proud of me, or whether or not he loved me. It’s a rare thing, especially for men. I wish more people were like my dad.
I held his hand and looked in his eyes when he went to his great reward. It was the most humbling experience of my life up to this point. I looked into the eyes of this great man and all I saw was love – not pettiness, not anger, not sorrow.
I know that I’ll miss him and I know he misses us, but I believe one day we’ll all get to see him again. I think he would hope that we would find it in our hearts to love one another in accordance with his beliefs, and to try to look past our manufactured differences.
Just understand that we are all God’s children. And, if we could all accept that and do unto others as we would have them do unto us, maybe we’d be a little bit closer to the love God gives us so freely, instead of fighting and bickering over pointless nonsense; hating each other over who’s right and who’s wrong; and just helping each other because it’s the right thing to do.
I wish more people were like my dad.
Sure wish I was.